Chapter 48 Chelsea
Chelsea
Ireach for him before I open my eyes.
I’m greeted with silence.
Cold stillness that makes my chest ache.
I slowly blink my eyes open. The moon is high. Its beams wash over the bedroom, casting silver light on the furniture, against the roses sitting on my dresser.
The roses—yesterday they were black and gold. Today they’re shriveled up.
I think about Echo.
When Eryx broke our magic, he broke all the magic we’d created, too—even the magic before we fully bonded.
I sink back onto the bed and close my eyes. I try to find the connection with Eryx and fail.
Over.
And over.
And over.
It’s well and truly gone.
I lift my hand and tug on my magic. It flares golden on my fingertips, ready to follow my command. I tug harder and it brightens. But it doesn’t make claws. It doesn’t have a line of inky power running through it.
And more than that, it feels empty.
Eryx took from me the one thing I had—choice.
A soft knock comes from the door. When I don’t answer, it slowly opens and there’s Eryx.
He’s dressed as if he’s been up for hours, showered, got ready for the day.
I stare at him, remembering what I said last night.
His gaze drops. “Morning.”
I don’t reply. There’s one thing I still control—letting him in.
“I know you’re mad.”
That’s not even the start of it.
“There’s breakfast.”
He’s talking about everything but what he did. I sit up and throw the covers off. I slip my feet into my slippers and walk out of my room to the kitchen.
He follows.
When I enter, Darla greets me. “Good morning.”
“Morning.”
I make a plate and head to the dining room to eat. Eryx does the same. We sit at our usual places.
I feel his eyes on me, the weight of his stare. But I don’t glance up as I force myself to nibble a slice of toast, bite into a sliver of avocado.
We eat like that, in silence.
When I can’t stomach any more food, I take my plate back to the kitchen and Darla. Then I go back to my room and lock myself in.
I might have to see him, but I don’t have to speak to him.
I do the same thing at dinner and breakfast the next day, and lunch, and dinner. I walk with him to the dining room, but I don’t say one word.
On the third night, Eryx puts down his fork and knife.
“Chelsea, can we please talk?”
“No.” My voice is dry. My words brittle.
“Please.” He folds his hands over his plate. “About this. About us.”
“What us?”
He flinches. Then says very slowly, “We need to put this behind us and move forward.”
My grip on my knife tightens. “So what can move forward?”
“Our relationship.”
“What relationship?”
The words explode out of me. And so does my magic. It shoots out at Eryx. His own responds quickly, the darkness flinging at my golden light. Touching it. Tangling with it.
I feel pain. Sorrow. Longing.
And rejection—our magics revolt at the feel of each other.
They slam into my plate and the porcelain shatters.
Eryx didn't just unbind us.
He made our magics incompatible.
I shield my face as sharp bits of china pelt my arm. When I lower it, there’s no damage to me, but the plate has been destroyed.
Eryx stares at it. His jaw flexes. His eyes fill with understanding.
A bitter laugh rips from my throat. “That proves it. We are broken, Eryx.”
He rises. His chair scrapes against the stone as he pushes it back and strides over to me, his long legs eating the distance between us in less than a heartbeat. Dark magic swirls around him, like shadows stretching. His icy eyes have gone black.
“We aren’t broken,” he says with Nightmare, his voice doubling.
I shrink back for half a second. He clocks it and the magic swirling around him, fueled by Nightmare, sputters.
I stop myself from shrinking. I’m not afraid of Eryx. If anything, I’m his match.
I rise and meet his stare. “I’ve been everyone’s pawn in my own life.
For one brief moment I had the chance to live for myself, but you took that away.
I’m just another Ovie and you’re another Charlie.
A marriage built on obligation, not choice.
” I swallow hard. “And I'll stay with a man who took my choice because I have nowhere else to go. Different names, same cage.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do know that! You gave me the world, and you took it away.”
“You would have died—”
“I would have rather died than feel this emptiness! Than look at you every day”—a sob tumbles from me—“and know you chose this for me. If you wanted a servant, a wife who’s worthless, that’s what you got. But I thought you wanted a match, Eryx. I thought you wanted me.”
I move to pass him, but he takes my arm.
I yank it away.
He stares at me, and then his chest falls. The darkness swirling in his eyes disappears, and he says very quietly, “Would you like to leave?”
Tears fall down my cheeks. “I can’t stay.”
The words break something in me as I say them.
Because I want to stay. I want him. I want us.
But staying means accepting what he did. Accepting that he'll make choices for me. That I don't get a say in my own life.
I fought too hard to become myself to go back to being someone's pawn.
He drops his head. “Then go. I’ll have Stave drive you home.”
Then he turns away.
I ache to reach out to him, to rewind time, to go back to a few days ago when we loved each other. Before Helena destroyed us. Before she wrecked the best thing that ever happened to me.
But it’s gone and there’s no getting it back.
As I head to my room, my footfalls echo off the walls. Each step feels wrong. Like I'm walking away from home.
I almost stop. Almost turn back. But then I remember: He chose this. He took my power, my claws.
So I keep walking.
When I reach my door and my steps go silent, I hear it—a sob coming from the dining room.
My hand freezes on the doorknob. He's breaking too.
But he made his choice.
I'm making mine.